Midsummer Fireflies off New England
by MomotsukiNezumi
Summary: ADOPTED FROM NanaMii148. Arthur, 11 years old, obsessed with black magic and his pet cat. Alfred, 10 years old, a wildly-imaginative Khaki Scout with a penchant for science, superheroes, and nerdisms. It's the summer of 1965, and the boys set out on a cross-country elopement, dragging along the locals, the Khaki Scouts, a cat named Gandalf, and Social Services along for the ride.
1. Author's Note

**I am a fan of both the 2012 film "Moonrise Kingdom", in all its unfettered, whimsical, eccentric glory, and Hetalia, the most insane, confusing, hilarious historical mashup I've ever seen. **

**So, when I came across this story last year, I was delighted. Unfortunately, it hadn't been updated, and upon contacting the author, I received the "OK!" to adopt the story and continue it. **

**So, I proudly present to you a Moonrise Kingdom/Hetalia crossover AU fic of epic proportions. Formerly called "Runaway", I have renamed it "Midsummer Fireflies off New England". Why? Fireflies are gorgeous to see in summer, Midsummer is a reference to Shakespeare, who to me is a literary genius, and also, I like New England. They have great seafood, and cozy little seaside inns, and lots of spooky ghost stories. **

**I have provided a character list below. Hopefully it will be useful. If not, go look watch the film again, and then compare it to Hetalia. It might make sense then. If not, keep calm and look for someone to explain it to you. Tea may be necessary to achieve full comprehension.**

**I dedicate this story to the original author, NanaMii148, who had the supreme intelligence and ingenuity to come up with such an amazing crossover AU in the first place. **

**CAST LIST OF CHARACTER COUNTERPARTS: **

**Sam Shakuzky: Alfred F. Jones (America)**

**Suzie Bishop: Arthur Kirkland (England/Great Britain/the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland)**

**Captain Duffy Sharp: Gilbert Belschmidt (Prussia)**

**Scoutmaster Randy Ward: Antonio Carriedo (Spain)**

**Walt Bishop/Mr. Bishop: Mr. Kirkland (Christopher) **

**Laura Bishop/Mrs. Bishop: Mrs. Kirkland (Rose)**

**The other Bishop boys: Alistair (Scotland), Connor (North Ireland), Brennan (Ireland), Evan (Wales), Peter (the Principality of Sealand)**

**Social Services: Yao Wang (China)**

**Cousin Ben: Francis Bonnefoy (France)**

**Commander Pierce: Ludwig Belschimdt (Germany)**

**Narrator: Matthew Williams (Canada)**

**The Khaki Scouts of North America: Ivan Braginski (Russia), Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia (the Baltic trio), Feliks (Poland), Romania, Greece, Turkey, Romano Vargas (South Italy), Feliciano/Venzenio Vargas (North Italy)**

**Khaki Scout (and stabbed-in-the-side-with-lefty-scissors) Redford: Cuba**

**The people in the church during the "Noak's Ark Flood" Play: Wy, Seaborga, Molassia, Kugelmugel, Hutt River, Ladonia (a.k.a. the various micronations), Australia, New Zealand, ****North Korea, Mexico, Brazil, Madagascar**

**The girls and boys involved in the "Noah's Ark Flood" Play and its orchestra: England, Hungary, Austria, Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Seychelles, Monaco, Belgium**

** Additional New Penzance/New England Local citizens extras: Natalya Arlovskaya (Belarus), Katsuyusha (Ukraine), Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Iceland, Norway (the Nordics), Mr. Puffin (Iceland's Penguin), Thailand, Macau**


	2. Chapter 1: And It Begins!

**This is the prologue/chapter 1 of the original story by NanaMii148. For the sake of originality and for my inner grammar instructor, I have corrected any mistakes in punctuation, grammar, etc. and given several additional descriptions and paragraphs for the story's background information. **

* * *

It was late at night on the little New England island fondly named New Penzance, the fireflies flitting about in dim clusters of dull gold in the weed-strewn backyard of the Kirkland house. The house itself, an old-fashioned colonial building with several turrets, towers, and a basement and attic, was four stories tall, and the size of a very large, somewhat lopsided pigpen. The walls were painted a pleasant shade of creamy olive green, with golden leaf overlay on the ornamental edges and spires of the front porch and all the windows. Most of these windows were simple glass, and several were broken, with tape plastered over them to cover up the fact that a baseball or rock had smashed through them. From an upstairs bedroom, the sound of a film being played could be heard through the window screen. Mosquitoes buzzed outside in irritating swarms in the muggy night air.

Peter shuffled across the hallway, rubbing his sleepy eyes and yawning, his eyebrows knitting together as he did so. It was 10 P.M. in the house, and the only thing the 6-year-old boy wanted was to bury himself in the sheets of his bed and sleep for days and days. But he couldn't. He couldn't sleep so much as a wink, because he wanted his unicorn plushie and the toy had, once again, disappeared and the boy would not go to bed without it.

"Th't stupid bast'rd..." he managed to mumble, too tired to pronounce the words correctly.

He stopped his night walk in front of a door with a multitude of colored papers pinned on it. Most of them were warnings, such as "You shall not pass!", or "Alistair give me my bloody faerie doll back!", and various death threats. There were a few lists in the middle, applied with tacks, whereupon the names of the people who were or weren't allowed to enter the room were written. On the "Will _never_ enter" list were written the names "Alistair, Connor, Brennan, Evan and Peter" and on the "Can enter _if_ they knock and ask nicely" were written the names "Mum and Dad". The only person on the "Can _always_ enter" list was their cat Gandalf, a small Scottish Fold tomcat with grey, folded over ears and large, intelligent greenish-grey eyes. Arthur had found him one day sitting on a branch from the oak tree outside his bedroom window, and had offered him a saucer of cream. The cat had stayed ever since, and for reasons no one else in the family could quite understand, only ever liked Arthur. Anyone else, Peter especially, ended up ignored, hissed at, or scratched and bitten. Peter complained often that Gandalf would leave cat hair and hairballs in his bed.

However, no one cared about the lists and they all entered without even glancing at them, often without knocking or asking nicely.

Peter cursed loudly, letting out a shout of, "Oi! Jerk Arthur, where did you put Glowy!?"

At his brother's lack of answer, Peter growled and pushed his way inside anyway. When they'd first moved here some time ago, everyone had gotten the chance to pick their own room. Arthur had searched the whole house and ended up deciding on this one, the smallest bedroom in the house, because it was farthest away from everyone else's rooms, and it also had the only stained-glass window (the window, to his delight, showed a richly-colored image of a sleeping baby unicorn, evidently for the enjoyment of the little girl whose room this had been before, during the time of the house's previous owners.).

The room was small and circular, with posters of the Beatles on the walls, a tall, skinny shelf spilling books everywhere, an old red floor rug, a clothes dresser pushed to one side with a lamp on it, and an old bed with an iron frame, a beat-up pillow, and a quilt. A locked box, which Arthur used to keep his money and his black magic compendium encyclopedia, was stashed under his bed, underneath a loose wooden floorboard.

and made his way towards the bed. The little boy was angry. His brother just kept stealing his Glowy and claiming ownership of it! He knew he was doing it just to piss him off because Glowy was clearly _his_! He had bought it himself at the little store in town! He was the one who made the 15-minute long trip to the toy shop and sacrificed his afternoon snacks to go buy it! He deserved that plushie!

Okay, so he _may_ have bought it with Arthur's money, which he'd filched from the box with an old hairpin. But it was _still_ his!

He took out the box under the bed and placed it next to the foot of the bed, taking the hairpin from his trouser pocket. He climbed on it to be able to reach the sheets, which he shook vehemently. Noticing that the form underneath the blanket wasn't moving, he pulled the sheets away, intent on throwing a right little fit to get Glowy back.

"I know you're not sleeping ! Where is-!"

* * *

"What are you doing in England?" the knight on the TV asked.

"Mind your own business!" replied back the angry Frenchman.

Rose, the only woman of the house, was lying on the bed and looking at the TV in front of her with a dull expression on her face, and a megaphone pressed to her chest. She brought a crisp to her mouth, completely ignoring her husband, who was sitting at the table behind her, looking desperately at the empty bottle of gin that he had turned upside down above his empty glass, waiting for some miracle to make the liquor appear again. No such miracle occurred.

Their evening activities were interrupted by a high-pitched scream at the first floor. Rose jumped from her couch, taken aback by the loud scream and Christopher, surprised, dropped his bottle with a cry of "Oh, crap!", causing it fall to the ground. Rose raised an eyebrow at her husband, who just shrugged, picking up the bottle and heading downstairs. The ginger-haired woman made her way up the stairs to find one of the door open. She entered to see a frightened-looking Peter sitting on the ground, trembling from head to toe and pointing at the bed shakily. She frowned at the sight of her son, quivering and wide-eyed as a mouse spotted by a hungry cat, on the ground. What on Earth was going on in there? But when she looked at the bed, she finally understood her son's reaction.

On the furniture was lying what probably used to be a life-size doll. However, her belly had been cut open, the stuffing spilling out and spotted with red paint to resemble blood, and evil clown heads were jumping out of it due to the spring they had been placed on. They had long tongues coming out of their mouths, bulging yellow eyes, and a sadistic look.

"What the-" she started to say before noticing a little paper taped on one of the clown heads. She took it and flipped it open with a small tug. As she read, her eyes widened. She held the megaphone up to her mouth and yelled angrily, "CHRISTOPHER! GET YOUR LAZY BUTT DOWN HERE NOW!".

* * *

Christopher, who had now gone downstairs to the kitchen and had been trying to find a new bottle of gin on one of the shelves, groaned at the sound of his name. He guessed that there would be no time for another drink tonight, judging from his wife's tone. As he walked towards the stairs, a hand rubbing his aching back, he saw his wife and his youngest son, Peter, rushing towards him. Rose had a frown on her face as she tossed the letter at him.

"Read." she ordered. Christopher, who didn't want to deal with his wife's anger, sighed and obeyed.

_Mum, Dad,_

_The doll was made with love for my idiotic brothers. I hope they appreciated my hard work. (But those ungrateful gits probably didn't.)_

_And, so as to avoid any sort of confusion, I just wanted to clarify that:_

_1. A raven stole your binoculars. It wasn't me. The raven came and took it. _

_2. Don't search for me anywhere, I'm not going back. But don't worry, I'm safe. I took some biscuits, some tea and some books with me. But you may want to restock the tea supply in the pantry now._

_3. Don't search for Gandalf, either. I took him with me. I'm the only one who loves him in this stupid family anyway. Poor cat's always getting kicked at by Peter. _

_Ceshar,_

_Arthur Kirkland._

_PS : Tell Peter that I've taken Glowy. It's my stuffed toy anyway. If he wanted it so badly, he shouldn't have gone and used my pocket money for it, and used his own money instead of spending it all on sweets._

Christopher narrowed his eyes at the letter, then at his wife, who was tapping her foot angrily on the ground. The megaphone was still on.

"So... Is this supposed to mean that our 11 year-old son just ran away with the cat and some biscuits?"

"And that jerk took Glowy!," cried Peter.

That was the last straw. Rose opened her mouth, the megaphone held at the ready, and started shouting.

* * *

The sun was a bright, fat coin of gold in the sky, the clouds in the distance various shades of white and grey. The birds were singing, the air was crisp and clean, and somewhere in the campground area there was a meek, gentle boy of Lithuanian descent shouting apologies over and over for accidently spilling the breakfast orange juice on the plate of a huge, childish-looking Russian boy with purple eyes and a scary smile.

It was morning at Camp Ivanhoe, home of the infamous Khaki Scouts of North America, their Scoutmaster, and a dog named Snoopy, who'd been given to the camp by a gentle Finnish man named Tino, and his housemate Berwald, a Swedish man with a thick accent and kind nature. The dog was fuzzy, with big, bright eyes and a bouncy, friendly personality, and was often snuck treats by the Italian brothers who lived in the tent nearest to his doghouse.

The boys of the camp had roots in Europe, and as such the entire place was stuffed full to the brim with culture clashes, historical conflicts, and the occasional prank war. The Scoutmaster, a tall, skinny man with curly brown hair, green eyes, and a cheerful, albeit somewhat ditzy manner, was a Spanish immigrant named Antonio Carriedo, who was referred to simply as "Scoutmaster Toni" by the more friendly boys, and "Scoutmaster Idiot", by an Italian boy named Romano Vargas, with dark hair, golden-brown eyes, and a habit of acting grumpy and swearing at almost everything.

Breakfast had just started a few moments ago, with the boys setting down on either side of the Scoutmaster with their usual habits of settling down to a meal: kicking, shoving, pushing, and chattering away like squirrels. The bacon was sizzling away on the cookstove, the Camp flag risen and flapping proudly in the wind, and everyone was reaching for the salt or the pepper, elbows flying every which way, as well as insults, in the process.

"This table is emptier than usual...", the Scoutmaster whispered to himself, perking up in the middle of his meal. He glanced at the table, only to find children eating their meal obediently. But there was an empty place at the table.

_Someone's missing__. _

He frowned. "Is anyone missing?"

"I don't know, ve." replied a boy with a sticking-plaster on his cheeks. This was Feliciano, the other Italian at camp and the twin to Romano, he was a cheerful, cowardly boy with a love of pasta and pretty girls. "Romano, is someone missing?"

Romano just shrugged. "Why would _I_ know? I don't even like the guy."

"I haven't seen Alfred yet!", came the cry of the Russian boy. This was Ivan Braginski, an immigrant from Russia who'd come over with his sisters Katsuyusha and Natalya, along with their Grandfather, who they called "General Winter", due to his rather cold, indifferent personality. Ivan was a somewhat childish Scout, with a habit of trying to make friends, but he had the unfortunate tendency to try to do this through various degrees of bullying. He and Alfred had never really gotten along very well at camp, so the rather gleeful tone with which Ivan had spoken wasn't very surprising.

"Alright, how about this, then. Has _anyone_ seen Alfred?"

All the boys looked at each other, asking to the boy next to them if they had seen Alfred. Most of them turned back to the man and shrugged.

"Nobody has seen him since yesterday evening sir."

"What do you mean, nobody has seen him since yesterday evening?", the adult replied, frowning. "That's not good..."

* * *

The scouts stopped in front of the tent bearing the number 34. Each boy was assigned their own tent, and could decorate the inside any way they liked. There was, naturally, an enthusiastic wave of decorating by the boys to make their tents feel more like home.

Ivan's tent had a patch of sunflowers growing behind it, and the inside of the tent had a little radio that played Russian folk tunes. The inside of his tent was always cold when Inspection Day came each week, and the other Scouts passed around a rumor that Ivan thus must live in an icebox.

Felik's tent was covered with a wraparound pink scarf, with a pony plushie standing guard at the door. So far, every time Inspection Day rolled around, anyone else, save for his friend Toris, who came into the tent would rush out and rinse their eyes with water afterwards, claiming to have been blinded by the bright colors inside.

Three of the scouts, Toris Laurinaitis, Raivis Galante, and Eduard von Bock, were all adopted siblings, each with distant relatives in Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia respectively. Their adoptive parents ran a boardinghouse in town that catered to European foreigners, which was how the Finnish and Swedish men had ended up giving them Snoopy. They had pitched their tents in a little ring together, with the tent flap doors facing inwards to a small firepit in the center. Old World folk music could occasionally be heard, wafting through the night air as they huddled together and talked in whispers.

The Italian boys had set their tents next to each other, with Romano growing a tomato patch in a planter box behind his tent, which he'd made using an old milk crate, some dirt from the ground, and a packet of tomato seeds he'd gotten from Scoutmaster Antonio after the man learned one morning that Romano liked to eat tomatoes. Feliciano had liberally applied dozens of handmade drawings and paintings onto the inside of his tent using tape and a box of old watercolor paints from the art store in town, and also had threaded pasta noodles onto a string of fairy lights attached to a battery box as a power source, and set them up around his tent as a sort of "fence." At night, the light shone through the pasta, making the elbow noodles glow as if magical.

Two of the Scouts, a Greek immigrant boy named Heracles, and a Turkish immigrant boy named Arca, got into fights so often that they'd had to be moved to opposite sides of camp, and pranks on each other were still common. Toilet paper had to constantly be shipped in to replace the paper used to tee-pee each other's tents at night.

It was easy to remember where Alfred's tent was, because there was an American flag poking out of the tent flaps at the top, fluttering in the breeze, the bright colors glowing in an almost garish contrast to the dull yellow color of the tent fabric.

Scoutmaster Antonio kneeled and started knocking on the fabric, as if it was a door.

"Jones? Are you there? Please, answer!"

A silence followed his question before he tried again, calling the boy's name. "Jones? Is something wrong? Hey, Jones!" At the lack of answers, he took a pocketknife out of his uniform pocket and unzipped the tent from the inside out. Inside, there was a small army cot with the covers still messy, several posters on the walls of comic-book superheroes, and a small, collapsable table in the corner, with a battery-powered lantern, a stack of comic books, and a candy bar wrapper on it. On one wall, there was a fabric copy of a map of New Penzance, attached to the wall with a few pieces of scotch tape.

But the occupant of the room wasn't there. It was a perfectly empty room. A silence filled the air once again,and Scoutmaster Antonio called the boy another time with a nervous tone. "Jones..?"

The boys behind him started to whisper things at each other's ears, wondering where their fellow Khaki Scout could have gone. The adult kept looking into the ridiculously small tent for a good minute, before noticing a fabric taped on the tent's wall. He frowned and approached the peculiar fabric. When he touched it, it gave in and revealed a hole, about the size of a rolled up, sideways sleeping bag, cut in the wall. The man's eyes widened, and he turned to the children, who were waiting for his answer eagerly.

"Jiminy Cricket, he flew the coop!"

* * *

Tony Stevenson was looking at the plate of food, a piece of trout and a pile of gravy-slathered mashed potatoes, that he had previously been eating with a rather desperate look. It was like the man was waiting to be hanged. He was definitively going to have terrible feedback from having lost one of his scouts. What would they think of a scout running away from the camp? Why did the Jones kid even have to run away in the first place?

One of the Scouts, a pale boy with blonde, shoulder-length hair and a Valley-Girl Polish accent, ran excitedly towards his elder, waving a small white letter at him. This was Feliks, and he was excited.

"Sir, sir, I like, found this letter in Alfred's tent! Come see!" he said, trying hard not to bounce up and down with excitement, a grin plastered on his face.

"A letter?" Toni repeated, finally looking up from his plate, and taking the letter from the blonde's hands.

"I'm the one who found it! I found it!"

"Yes, and that's wonderful Feliks. Fantastic." he said in a monotonous tone, patting the boy's head.

When he opened the letters he could see written in big red letters, the scrawl childish:

_Dear Mr. Toni,_

_I just wanted to tell you that it's not your fault that I ran away. But I need to do something important, so I can't stay here anymore. The other guys won't mind, I don't think they like me too much. Plus, I'm kind of tired of waking up to find my hand in a bowl of water. It's not fun. _

_Also, I've taken my scout equipment and your cookie jar. I'm sorry, but I was hungry, and I already ate all my snack food. When I grow up to be big and strong, I will pay you back with Oreos or something. Thanks for all the help on being a Scout, I don't think that I'll be eaten by bears anymore. _

_Goodbye,_

_Alfred F. Jones_

_PS : Wait, you like Oreos right? Or should I get you some chocolate-chip cookies?_

"What does it say? What does it say?", Feliks asked, jumping up and down in an attempt to read over Toni's shoulder.

The Scoutmaster just stared for a moment at the letter, a look of disbelief on his face, and then put it down on the table to look at the boy staring at him with wide eyes full of excitement.

"It says that there will be no cookies tonight. We need to find him."

The boy's face fell and his eyes began to tear up. "What? No cookies?"

* * *

**My thanks again to NanaMii148. Hopefully, this is a decent revision of your story. **


	3. Chapter 2: Anyone missing a Khaki Scout?

The air was warm, slightly muggy, and the sky was a pale blue-grey, clouds approaching in the distance. A huge field of wheat and dried, yellowing grass stretched out past the hills and beyond. The ground, covered in various shades of green or yellow grass, and showing patches of dirt and rock, was worn smooth in the middle, where a thin, winding path led out into the woods. Small twigs, dried leaves, and the occasional mushroom could be seen littering the pathway.

Two boys stood facing each other in the field: a sandy-haired 11-year-old in brown cargo pants, a white shirt, a pair of faded Sunday school shoes, and a dark green sweater vest with a cluster of pale pink flowers trailing across the sides, holding a wicker suitcase in one hand, and a small closed picnic basket to his side, rather like a purse, from which a tiny window revealed the sleeping face of a small cat. There was a pair of black binoculars dangling from his neck by a leather cord, and the suitcase was full to the point of looking rather cramped. The other boy, a 10-year-old with brown-blonde hair, ruffled by the wind, was dressed in a Khaki Scout uniform, a pair of somewhat battered sneakers, a coonskin fur cap with the tail still on, and a rather bulky-looking backpack with a pair of bedrolls tied to the top. His cowlick, an unruly strand of thick hair shaped like the island of Nantucket, swayed in the breeze.

It was Alfred who spoke first.

"Where you followed?"

"No."

He walked over. "Good to see you made it, Arthur, do you have all your...is that...a cat...in there?" He leaned down, peering into the picnic basket to check. Gandalf growled softly, licking the human's hand and staring at him very hard for a moment, before deciding that the smell of hamburger was okay, and going back to sleep. Arthur hummed slightly, replying, "Yes, this is Gandalf. He's my cat, the rest of my family doesn't like him. I think it might be because he's smarter than most of them."

Alfred nodded, understanding that some things were better left alone. He could understand some animals being smarter than people, since all the cats that came to camp during Hot Dog Night somehow mananged to evade every attempt to catch them before they stole all the cooked frankfurts. "Well, I've got my stuff packed with me, and it looks like you're set, too. I mapped out a trail for us to follow, since the path will take a couple of days to go through, you're not a very experienced hiker, and you're wearing Sunday school shoes."

Arthur scowled a bit at this, muttering back, "Well, Peter ruined my sneakers last week by dropping paint on them! And it's not like I have anything else to use, I've got my stupid brothers to share everything with!"

He only got a smile in response, before he held out his hand. After a moment of hesitation, Arthur took it, linking their fingers together. Both boys started walked back down the trail, heading into the woods. Arthur stubbornly refused to remove his hand from Alfred's hold, despite the tight grip feeling as if it was crushing his fingers. Alfred's hand was warm, and the biting wind picking up across New Penzance was becoming too big to ignore any longer.

As they wandered deeper into the field, the tall grass now past their heads, Arthur recalled how they first met, only a scant six months before...

* * *

FLASHBACK: 6 MONTHS EARLIER

The island was awash with color, the local church a bustling hive of activity as people squeezed into the tiny space, seating themselves on the old, rickety wooden benches to watch the annual performance of "Noah's Flood" by the local children. Multiple families were squished into the packed seating, rather like tins of sardines, all chattering away in a mixture of English, and in some cases, a smattering of Western European tongues. The Kirkland family in particular took up an entire pew by themselves, Peter playing a game of underground football with his wool cap, Connor and Evan trying futilely to keep Peter quiet, and the older boys Alistair and Brennan gawking at the pretty, rather busty girl Katsuyusha, who was unfortunate enough to be sitting in front of them, sandwiched between her younger siblings Natalya and Ivan. Their grandfather stood in the shadows of the church column nearby, unwilling to partake fully in the garishly bright festivities. The Khaki Scouts of North America, having been brought here by their insanely cheerful Scoutmaster Toni, were crowding up all the pews to the right side of the church, kicking each other and whispering as they tried to fend off boredom. In the massive crush of people in the little church, the Scoutmaster didn't notice as one of his troop members slipped away to explore.

The church was cheerfully lit with a collection of butter-yellow candles and a series of fairy string lights donated by the Vargas family, who were friends with the owner of the arts and crafts store in town. Darting up and down the isles were several small children, all of which were rather hyperactive due to the amount of chocolate they'd been generously gifted with earlier from Bella, the nice Belgian girl who'd moved to New Penzance a year or so back with her rather frightening older brother Lars.

Behind the church, there was a yellow school bus in the parking lot, the doors open to let out a stream of girls and boys who were part of the New Penzance school choir. Somewhat unfortunately, all the motley group of schoolchildren had managed to do so far was stand around in their animal costumes for the play, mumbling their lines and hissing at each other when someone messed up, or huddle in a corner playing horrifically off-key music on the clarinet or flute.

But this didn't interest the 10-year-old boy in the slightest; he had something much more important to do than listen to horribly inaccurate musical recitations. Alfred F. Jones had spotted someone coming off that school bus that had immediately piqued his interest, and it wasn't just because the guy smelled like burnt food. There was just something, something _special_ about this person, and he was determined to find out what it was.

But in order to find out just what that was, he'd have to find him first. The search was long and tedious, with bathrooms searched and people angered about strange boys in uniforms barging in. The stairway was clear, and so were the hallways, and Alfred wasn't stupid enough to think that his quest was over just yet. He'd noticed that the people performing as animals in the play were all heading off down one particular hallway, so logically, it must be the dressing rooms. Feeling reassured in his own cleverness, he darted off down the hallway, pushing through a door and peering through a thick wall of costumes to see who was present. Fingers absentmindedly shoved the pink fluff of a feather boa away from his eyes as he took in the sight before him.

Seated at the communal dressing table were a half dozen children and preteens in animal costumes, mainly birds. However, his attention was glued solely to the only person in dark colors, a boy an avian costume all in black, the feathers jagged and wild, as if he was wearing the shadow of some unnamed wild beast. His sandy-blonde hair was messy, stuffed hastily beneath a black feather headdress, and there was white paint streaked across his cheeks, as if to imitate whiskers. Sharp, acid-green eyes, the color seeming to hover close to emerald, stared unflinchingly at the strange person who'd come in unannounced through the costume rack like a ghost.

In contrast, the girl sitting beside him was clad in a striking blue and white avian outfit with opera gloves, and her rather bluntly attention-gaining colors seemed to match her personality, because she turned to Alfred and said haughtily, "Boys aren't allowed in here, not unless they're part of the play. You're not in costume, so get out."

Alfred ignored her, still focusing on the boy in the avian suit. "What kind of bird are you?"

The girl in the blue and white garb spoke up, pointing to the other play actors and actresses in turn. "I'm a raven, she's a sparrow-"

He shook his head slightly, feeling frustrated at not getting the answer he'd wanted. "No," he said, pointing a finger at the boy in the black feathers, "What kind of bird...are _you_?"

The boy blinked, eyes looking slightly embarrassed as he muttered quietly, "I'm a raven."

Alfred nodded, as if this was the logical thing to say. "I'm Alfred."

"My name's Arthur," came the quiet reply. Not sure what else to say, Alfred looked about for a moment, trying to figure out how to keep the conversation going, before his gaze fell upon the slender, bandaged hand rubbing circles across Arthur's opposite wrist. "What happened to your hand?"

The sandy-blonde looked down at the injured hand, his gaze somewhat sheepish, as he muttered, "Got mad, lost my temper. Ended up punching a mirror and breaking glass all over the place."

For a moment, they simply stared at each other, and then the peace was interrupted by the sudden arrival of the play manager, a rather stressed-out, stern-looking woman in a stuffy vest who stuck her head into the dressing room, starting to talk about getting onstage, before she spotted Alfred and hissed, "Who are you? What are you doing in here, and how'd you get in? Nevermind, just get back to your seat!"

Alfred darted back through the halls and back out the building, barely managing to mumble a quick, "Write me!" to the raven-boy, as he scrambled back to his seat.

When the play began and the children began mangling their lines at the tops of their voices, Alfred's eyes were drawn to the single black-clad preteen on the Ark prop, who was chanting the main theme as if it were a spell incantation: high, then low, then wavering a bit in the middle, then soaring again. It wasn't half bad.

After the play was over and the people began filing out, lugging sleepy toddlers in their arms and talking to their still animal-like children, Alfred F. Jones boarded the section of the school bus set aside for the Khaki Scouts and found a letter on his seat. On the paper, there were a few lines in neat, though somewhat cramped, penmanship:

_Write to me. Arthur Kirkland, _

_42 Summer's End, New Penzance _

Arthur woke up the next morning, Gandalf holding a slightly soggy letter in his mouth, and taken it upon himself to respond. The penpal relationship had bloomed from there.

Their letters ranged from the funny topics, such as the time when Gandalf had stepped in wet paint and walked all over the house (Peter had been blamed, due to him leaving out the blue paint bucket from his chore repainting the birdhouse out back), to the more serious issues, amoung them Arthur's fights with his older brothers, his problems with fitting in with others his age due to his cynical attitude and love of "freaky" magic, and Alfred's issues at his foster homes due to being unable to make any real friends (for some reason, no one liked hearing about aliens, superheroes, or playing pranks on other kids). Sometimes the letters would be sent in a lumpy envelope, bulging with little trinkets and knickknacks from their homes, usually pinecones and pebbles from the forest near Camp Ivanhoe, bits of colored string and new pennies from Arthur's house (Alfred had found that he could trade them with Feliciano to get paint and paper from the art store), and many drawings and sketches painted with watercolors. This art was kept hidden in the locked box under the loose floorboard under Arthur's bed, since some of them weren't the kind he'd want Peter running his mouth about. Occasionally, homemade good luck charms and talismans found their way from Arthur's hands to the table in Alfred's tent at Camp Ivanhoe, meant to keep away the ghosts that Alfred had feared haunted the grounds at night after a round of Russian scary stories. If Scoutmaster Toni ever wondered why his Scout's bedside table was often cluttered with crudely carved wooden amulets and necklaces made of daisy chains and little glass jars of sage and yew wood, he never said a word.

Eventually, though, they both knew that something had to be done. There were only so many times Alfred could stand being picked on and made fun of at camp, and Arthur himself was sick and tired of being bullied or teased by his brothers, of the constant nagging from his Mum and Dad to deal with it.

The escape, in retrospect, was to be expected. Planned in letters back and forth, Alfred's containing overly complicated diagrams of escape routes and ideas of survival, Arthur's more practical and neat in the designing, until finally, after a few months, they'd figured out a rough idea of their elopement. Not wanting to go alone, they had decided it would be best if they ran off together instead, shouldering the work between them of scrounging out a life away from all the annoyances of their lives.

_Dear Arthur,_

_When?_

_Alfred_

The reply was fast, he remembered, delivered with the rapid speed only the truly determined could produce.

_Dear Alfred, _

_Where?_

_Arthur_

He'd barely finished breakfast the next morning, when he'd felt a feeling of nervous excitement come over him.

He left the house, checking the mail, and found that the final answer arrived. He took it out of the mailbox, heading straight for the little bus stop by the street, and sat down on the only seat in the cramped space. The letter was pried open with his fingers, as acid-green eyes scanned the writing.

_Dear Arthur, _

_Walk thirty paces down the old meadow path that has not got any name on it. Be ready to leave, I've got my stuff packed already._

_Alfred_

Arthur headed back inside, stuffing the letter in with the others in the locked box, and packed his binoculars (for fairy sightings), his picnic basket (Gandalf would be using it to nap in), and his suitcase (full of spare clothes, a half dozen or so of his favorite books, a toothbrush, some records he'd gotten as a present from his godmother, and the record player he was borrowing from his brother Connor). A hastily scribbled note was left to explain the absence of the record player, and then he opened up the picnic basket; Gandalf, being a very smart feline, immediately understood what was going on, and leapt in without so much as a single meow of complaint. The basket was closed, and then Arthur left the house through the back door leading to the kitchen, heading off to the meadow.

Thus, things had come full circle.

* * *

There was a chilly breeze in the air, the sky beginning to gain some dark clouds, and the steely-blue sea was churning slightly, a bit choppier than usual. New Penzance, being a rather small island community off the mainland, had only one small police station, a tiny one-room building in white and blue paint that sat on a dock leading out onto the open water, with the mainland visible directly in the distance some fifty or so miles away. Inside, the walls were packed to the ceiling with filing cabinets crammed full of reports, records, and daily logs, and there was a small foldout table with a coffee mug full of pencils, an old-fashioned phone, and a sheet of the day's report on top. The rickety metal foldout chair was missing one support on the back left foot. Two doors, one in the front, and one in the back, led in and out of the little station; the back led out to the very end of the docks, with a bucket full of bait and a fishing pole being provided for entertainment on the days with no activity. A single four-paned window let the only occupant peer out across the bay.

Nearby the police station, sitting on cement blocks on the shore and facing the trees of the forest, there was a small trailer, dented here and there, where the local New Penzance Police officer lived. Opposite this was the island's only police car, which thus had the dubious honor of an uncensored license plate proclaiming "AWESOME!" for the world to see.

The local New Penzance Police officer wasn't the most beloved person in town, being loud, brash, reckless, and somewhat arrogant, with an unusual appearance to match: silver hair, skin the color of fresh milk, and eyes the color of freshly-spilled blood. His enthusiastic, rather intrusive nature had left a lasting impression on anyone who had the fortune, or misfortune, to meet Captain Gilbert Belschmidt, though it had earned him several drinking buddies at the local bar.

However, despite his rather eccentric nature, he was still human, still able to be surprised. Today, it seemed, was no exception: only a few minutes earlier, he'd received a call on his radio from Camp Ivanhoe. Judging from the rather nervous report from Scoutmaster Antonio Carriedo of Troop 55, an escaped Khaki Scout had run off with camping equipment, two bedrolls, a miniature canoe, some fishing tackle, an air rifle, and a jar of cookies. He tried valiantly to ignore the sounds of outrage in the background on Scoutmaster Toni's end, all shouts of dismay and curse words as the rest of the boys discovered the loss of the cookies.

Thankfully, the Scoutmaster was more understanding of the situation, and continued to talk.

"Well, who's responsible for the kid, anyway?"

Scoutmaster Toni's end of the call was silent for a moment, before a rustle of paper and a triumphant "Aha!" resulted in the resuming of the conversation. "I've got his page in the register. Let's call up his folks, we need to tell them what happened so that they don't panic."

A sound of agreement came through the mouthpiece, and arrangements were made to come down to the local post office, where the nearest clear radio reception was, so that both men could notify Alfred's home at the same time, to help avoid any confusion. The U.S. Mail post office was only slightly larger than the police station, and crammed with numerous mailboxes, safes, and the control panel machine that allowed for communication between different parts of the island. As the room was somewhat small to begin with, adding Captain Belschmidt, Scoutmaster Toni, and the woman who worked at the post office all led to a rather cramped environment. The fact that this woman was also eating a rather strong-smelling tuna salad sandwich didn't help matters.

A crackle of static later, and then a voice could be heard, confirming the connection was working. The two men didn't waste time, rapidly explaining the situation.

Unfortunately, the people on the other end of the line were not so concerned. "Well, this isn't the first time that boy's made some kind of trouble. It's just not fair for the others, so I'm sorry, but we can't invite him back."

Captain Belschmidt blinked in confusion, replying somewhat stiffly, "What do you _mean_, you can't invite him back? Does he need an invite to get into your house, for God's sakes?"

A sigh could be heard on the other end, before the man who had spoken up replied again, this time in the sort of resigned, nonchalant way that seemed to have good intentions, but ultimately seemed useless. "Well, I thought you _knew_. Alfred's an orphan, his folks passed away a number of years ago in a boating accident off the coast. We're _foster _parents, we've been housing him since last June."

The two men in the post office stared at each other, not quite sure what to say, before Captain Belschmidt managed to find his voice and rasped out, "Well, what the hell's that got to do with anything? You've still got to take care of him, you took him in! What, is there something wrong with him to you, or something?"

The voice on the other end of the line replied calmly, as if he'd expected this. "Well, you see, Alfred's not exactly _normal_, per se. He's...he's emotionally disturbed from the death of his parents, and it's not uncommon for him to do things like this. One time, he tried jumping off the roof of our house with a bed sheet, claiming he wanted to try to see if he could fly like Superman. Another time, he ended up convinced that there were ghosts in his room, and he'd wake up every night screaming from nightmares. No one got any proper sleep for weeks, and the other children yelled at him for making them miss sleep. It's...it's just not _right_ to have him here, it's not good for him, or for anyone else."

Scoutmaster Toni leaned back against one of the walls, pinching the bridge of his nose as he mulled over Alfred's lack of parents. _Why wasn't this put in the register? It probably would've explained why he's always so loud, always trying to grab peoples' attention. He's an orphan, and from the sound of things, his foster parents don't sound very understanding. _

This left a problem, however, and they knew it. Captain Belshmidt spoke up again. "Well, what's going to happen, then? If he can't stay with you, what'll be done with him? What do we do?"

A crackle of static from the receiver. "I expect Social Services will deal with him. Good luck!"

The call ended. Scoutmaster Toni turned to his fellow companions, his tan face unusually grave. "We need to send out a search party. We can't wait for Social Services to do something, he's out there all alone. Let's go!"

* * *

Back at Camp Ivanhoe, Scoutmaster Toni was leading his ragtag group of Troop 55 out the gates of the campground, towards the forest. Feliks raised a hand, asking curiously, "What's your _real _job, sir?"

"I'm a math teacher!", he replied. At his Scouts' incredulous looks, he elaborated. "Middle school math, nothing too high up. And I get free tomatoes from the garden at the school, so I can grow my own lunch!"

He turned more serious after a moment, turning to his Troop members as he spoke. "This is a search and rescue mission, and you're to use all your wilderness survival training to help you. When you find him, make sure he's ok, and bring him back, understand?"

Ivan Braginski grinned, a somewhat malicious glint in his violet eyes, as he said cheerfully, "We can use force, da?"

The adult of the group blinked, confused, before saying hastily, "_No, _you can't use force on him! Your mission is to _find _him, not to hurt him. Don't use force, under any circumstance, got it?"

The boys nodded obediently, before going off to huddle and talk about their orders. Ivan's suggestion of force hadn't gone unconsidered, seeing as Alfred was the least popular boy at camp due to his waging of prank wars, bizarre humor, and his lack of being able to read the atmosphere properly. Any protests against potential violence on the behalf of Toris, Eduard, and Raivis were ignored due to the terrifying aura produced by Ivan.

Snoopy was given Alfred's scent to track using an old sweaty gym sock from last Friday's wash, and the Khaki Scouts of Troop 55 set off into the woods, armed with a bow and arrows, a bowie knife, a huge wooden mallet riddled with nails, and several sharp hatchets. The hunt was on.


	4. AUTHOR'S NOTE! PLEASE READ!

**IMPORTANT! PLEASE READ!**

**To all you readers and followers of my stories, please note that there will be NO updates or uploads of ANY stories of mine from June 6, 2013-June 26, 2013 (unless I am very lucky and can beg a relative to let me use their computer to type).**

**The reason for this is quite simple: I'M GOING TO EUROPE THIS SUMMER!**

**Yes, that's right, I'm going off to that madcap continent of gorgeous European history, equally gorgeous people, and general tourist-attracting awesomeness. My family and I are heading to Western Europe for about three weeks or so, give or take a few days, and as this is the first time that I've gone to Europe since I was about five or so years old, I'm quite excited. The only memory I've got from then is when my Grandma took me to feed the goats.**

**I can't wait to go, we're spending time in England, Wales, France, Spain, and Germany, and possibly Switzerland and Italy! **

**The fact that I'm an avid Hetalia fan, proud Doctor Who nut, lifelong Harry Potter fanatic, _and_ a longtime history lover is also quite influential on this, since the entire time I'm over there, I'm probably going to be preoccupied with thinking about "Where _am_ I on this nation's body?" or "Wait, is that a TARDIS!? No wait, it's just an ordinary 1960s police box, never mind, false alarm! Although my Tardis key won't work on it, then..." or "Oh Merlin, that's that studio movie set for Hogwarts! I want to see inside, let me in, let me in! I've got a wand!" XD**

**The fact that I get to go to England first (and last, we're leaving through Heathrow) is also a major plus, as my family is convinced (and quite rightly so) that I seem to have an obsession with the United Kingdom's popular culture and history, which is probably due in part because I was raised on a literary diet of Harry Potter, the Lord of the Rings, the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Peter Pan, and have a lifelong love of tea, scones, and fish n' chips. My liking of Eddie Izzard humor also plays a massive part in it, since now I can't even look at the European Union without thinking of the European Dream of "Hilda! Hilda! Wake up Hilda! I dreamt that every single country in Europe spoke a different language and they hated each other. Oh wait, that's true isn't it?"**

**My family each gets to choose a part of Europe that they want to visit, so this is a basic list of where in the massive European World Meeting chaos we'll be in for most of June:**

**1) ME: I chose the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, so I get to go to London (though thankfully my folks remember which side of the road to drive on), Stonehenge ("Helllllllllllllooooooooooooo, Stonehenge! Whoever takes the Pandorica, takes the universe!" XD), Torchwood (though the lack of Captain Jack Harkness will be a bit off-putting for my inner fangirl), the RAF Museum (I'm going to be looking at all the uniforms for ages and ages), Churchill's bunker (Which, thanks to that "Skyfall" movie last year, I will forever associate with a secretly relocated base of operations for the M16), plus that nice town in Wales that is dedicated completely to Doctor Who (which means my family will probably have to drag me away kicking and screaming "NO! I don't want to leaaaaaavvvvvvveeeeeeee!")! I even get to bring along my friend Ellie's special "Weeping Angel" edition hand painted converse, so I can RUN LIKE THE 10TH DOCTOR (Although it will be a bit harder to take off my shoes if I have to look without blinking)! And I get to drink all the tea that I want, which is great since I consume over a pint every day over here alone, over there I can go wild and no one will stare at me like I'm nuts! **

**2) MY SISTER: She chose France (for me, it's the land of the fashionably-dressed and the home of great cheese), so we're going to fly over there from England into Paris (I kind of wanted to take the Tube, since it reached the big 150-anniversary this year and if I could I would stay in England longer, but my folks said no, it's too crowded). We'll be sightseeing tourists in silly clothes, lugging backpacks and trying to drink the Starbucks that have sadly invaded such a lovely country. The Louvre, the Tour Eiffel, and several old castles are on the list of stuff to see, although my sister and I are going to be tour guides for this particular country (I took 4 years of French, my sister took 2 so far), so hopefully we won't get lost! I'm going to feel kind of strange over there, since I'm going to be able to eat all the bread and cheese I want (two things my mother has claimed for a long as I can remember that I could literally live off of if I wanted to), but I'm the only one in our family that drinks tea on a constant basis (everyone else drinks coffee, which I don't like whatsoever, since it's too off-tasting for me)...**

**3) MY MOM: Spain is her choice. She really wants to go somewhere nice and sunny and friendly, and Spain is a good place for that sort of thing. I just wish that I could stop thinking of Hetalia's Spain though, since I'll be over there and all I'll be able to think of is "Hmm, how close am I to Spain's butt?" (if you're wondering about that, just remember that he has a great-looking backside XD). And since we're going in June instead of August or September, unfortunately, we can't take part in the tomato-throwing festival, which looks ridiculously fun and amazing to do (Seriously, it's a day where you're literally all but _required_ to throw tomatoes at each other like a crazy paint war, that's awesome!).**

**4) MY DAD: He wants to go to Italy. In which case, we're going to be facing wild, possibly dangerous drivers (where my Dad will fit right in, since he drives really fast and is kind of reckless at times), loads of great food (I'm probably going to inwardly yell "PASTAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" every time I eat something), incredible artwork (I'm using some of my allowance to buy some pencils and a sketchpad for this country), and visiting Rome (in this case, all I'll be able to think about the whole time is Grandpa Rome on the gondola back in WW2 singing "In Hell, all the cooks would be British, the police would all be German, and the engineering would fall to the French..." XD) and the Roman Coliseum.**

**5) SWITZERLAND AND GERMANY: I know that Germany is a definite place we're going to, since I have a ton of cousins and relatives over there (My paternal Grandmother lived on a little farm on Silesia with her family, a bunch of farm animals, and possibly the most dangerous children's swing set in all of Europe (it was literally a pair of ten feet tall wooden stakes (a bit like the logs they throw in the Highland Games), with a thick plank of wood suspended by two thick metal chains, and the swing seat was at least six feet off the ground. You had to stand on it to swing properly, and one time someone swung too far out and ended up flying off it and landing face first (unharmed but very stinky afterward) in the manure pile XD). I love German food, my Grandma literally raised me on that stuff, it's delicious (although now our sauerkraut jar at home is half-empty thanks to my efforts).**

**Switzerland, I'm not so sure if we're going to go visit. We have some relatives living there, but I don't know if our schedule will allow us to go for longer than a day or two at most, if even that. If we do go, I hope we can see the Cern Facility, it looks really, really cool. Although I'm probably going be feeling paranoid most of the time...**

**And as I'm of drinking age in Europe now, I CAN HAVE BEER (And wine, but that's beside the point)! Hopefully, no one in my family gets crazy with the alcohol, since over half my relatives in Europe are German, and their beer is supposed to be awesome. If I actually get drunk, hopefully I don't end up acting like Prussia, since I don't want to be arrested. Prison would be bad for me, I'd annoy everyone else in there by spouting facts about Wrackspurts and Nargles all day.**

**Well, I've got finals to do (my math teacher seems to be human incarnate of the sadistic pink bunny rabbit from that "When You're Evil" fanmade music video), stuff to pack into my backpack (just the essentials: duct tape, clothes, spare tea, etc.), and then it's off to the airport full of super-paranoid American security precautions (though you can't really blame them), and then praying to Jashin, Warg, Pein, L, Merlin, and every single deity from the "Percy Jackson and the Olympians" series that we don't end up with an exploded engine, or crash onto an island like on "Lost", or end up becoming trapped and super paranoid and threaten to throw each other off the plane like on that episode of "Doctor Who" entitled _Midnight. _**


	5. I'M BAAAAAAAAAAACK!

**Hello, my beloved minions! I mean, readers, yes, that's it, readers, hehe...**

**I have returned from that lovely, madcap continent known as EUROPE! Almost three whole weeks of nothing but MADNESS! THE MADNESS!**

**Three weeks of sexy European accent overload, three weeks of tasty foreign food, three weeks of driving around in a crazy rental car with a GPS so horrible that, in honor of the author DragonQueenSori, who came up with such a hilarious thing in the forst place, I ended up dubbing the damn thing the infamous name "Hitler" (I'm not kidding, that thing was EVIL. It wouldn't take any address punched into it, it would send us all over the map with super complicated directions, then it told us to turn or stop where we shouldn't or couldn't, and it wouldn't take any GPS coordinates we put into it. All the while with that same monotonus voice that made me want to tear it out of the rental car and stab it with something. The GPS in France was, if possible, WORSE: this one had all the flaws of the first GPS, but it also wouldn't tell us where to turn until we were already doing the turning, and it's directions were even more horrible. We typed in the coordinates to get to the CERN Facility in Switzerland (we had enough time to go visit for a day if we got up early to get a head start on the driving), and it sent us to a campground...in the mountains...in the the middle of one of the barely-mapped areas...on a one-way only road. Mom and Dad got so angry that we couldn't find CERN that we almost didn't go because Dad refused to drive unless Mom would help him find the right directions. Dad and I named this GPS "H2" after he vetoed "Napoleon".). And then the French gave us the wrong rental car, we asked for a Mercedes and we got a rental car that had no English instruction manual, too many unexplained buttons, a stuck "child safety lock" on both sides of the back seat, and a very narrow front window...which got a crack across the windshield after getting hit by a rock in high-speed traffic while driving in Germany. **

**But the people we met across Europe were pretty cool, very helpful and polite to us. In England, I even met a nice Australian man and his lady friend who showed me where the nearest store with Jaffa Cakes was. Those things are AWESOME, I ended up splitting a three-pack with my sister by Buckingham Palace and then my Dad surprised me with a supersize pack the next day (which I ate within about 3 days with only a little help, I think I left the UK as a permanent Jaffa Cake junkie).****The people in Wales and France were pretty nice too (well, in France we did have a few problems when we ran into this very aggressive waiter in St. Tropeze who insisted that we order exactly as he wanted us to, or else we could leave. We ended up eating that night at the restaurant across the street, which had a very nice waitress who my sister and I translated for, since she didn't speak enough English to talk to my parents.). I just wish that the French in Paris would be a bit...more hygenic about their sidewalks and streets. Everywhere we went in Paris, the pets and birds left little disgusting "presents" everywhere that no one would clean, so we had to step around them all the time. The smoking, though, we could deal with alright, since most of Europe likes to smoke everywhere, even though it made it kind of hard to enjoy a meal at times when the guy behind or in front of you is surrounded by a cloud of smoke that gets blown your way by the wind all the time. The Doctor Who experience in Cardiff was awesome, Dad even got to try out a spare Dalek prop and freak out the other visitors with "Exterminate! Exterminate!" every few minutes, and I had a major fangirl moment upon getting to check out all the costume props (although the regeration of the 10th Doctor they had replaying in the background of the 2005 Tardis control room made me want to cry...). The Harry Potter Experience on the outskirts of London was also epic, they gave us a full tour and showed us all the major props and costumes and sets involved, and I got to have Butterbeer for the second time in my life! That stuff really _is _magic. Although the fact that they only sell it both there and in Florida made it kind of hard not to crack up laughing...Darn my Hetalia associations with international locations. St. Tropeze was a great little French town by the sea, nice people, good food (although everyone wanting to order the beef stew with gnocchi made it hard to decide on dinner), and there was even a nice little Italian gelato shop where the servers scoop out triple-scoop ice creams that they sculpt into the shape of blooming roses (and let me tell you, the "after-dinner" mint chip, chocolate mousse, and "Tiramisu" ice cream combination is pure _magic_.). **

**Getting to France from Wales was harder than we thought it would be: only a few minutes after boarding the flight to Paris, we were informed by the pilot that our flight would be delayed for an hour or so because the French airport we were supposed to land in had all its workers go on strike. It was quite awkward for me, I'd never experienced that before. Although it _was_ kind of funny to hear the pilot sigh and tell us over the intercom, "Attention all passengers, terribly sorry about the delay, but the French have gone on strike again. Would anyone like a complementary drink while we wait?" **

**Dear Merlin, between the British Museum and the Louvre, I think I could just live in museums forever and ever, there's just so much cool stuff to see! Dad and I both can stay at a museum for hours, it drives Mom nuts. Between those two places, I don't think that I'll ever need to see Egypt or Greece, there's so much stuff from both places, it's insane. Switzerland was cool, the CERN Facility was a total geekout-fest for me, since I like Physics, but the 55 MPH driving speed they had everywhere drove Dad nuts XD**

**I really liked it in Germany, the food was delicious, the architecture was gorgeous, and the people were nice. Since I have tons of relatives over there, we stayed with several cousins and their families. Their households remind me of Hobbit-holes: warm, cheerful, homey, with a bunch of stuff everywhere, and enough food and nice company for you to want to stay forever. Beer has officially become part of the things I miss about Europe, since I'm still too young to drink in the U.S. and I've become used to having it at mealtimes. I can just _see _a mental image of a tiny little Prussia chibi scowling because there will be no proper beer...**

**I'm seriously going to miss being able to eat the food in Europe, so fresh and not stuffed with preservatives and hormones. Even the little bakeries and meat shops they have are better than all the supermarkets back home, where you** **have to go to a pricey specialty shop to get anything even close to really good quality. **

**And as insane as it may sound to some, out of all the different kinds of food we had in Europe, I honestly miss England's food the most. Yorkshire Pudding, endless custard jugs, the bottles of ginger beer, the endless cups of tea (I kind of overindulged, since Mom wouldn't normally let me drink so much back home, but it _was_ England, so she let it slide), Jammy Dodgers, Jaffa Cakes, fish n' chips, meat pies, baked beans on toast for breakfast, and about a million other things that I tried that I miss. I even miss the black pudding, and my mother thought I was crazy for liking that. Well, at least if I study over there, I know that I won't starve. Mom and Dad were surprised at the food, they (well, unfortunately, my Mom did, my Dad can, and will, eat pretty much anything) thought the food would be bad, but it turns out that the food was great! Dad even joked that the "bad cooking" stereotype was a rumor created by jealous Parisians XD **

**The food aside, I'm going to miss the double-decker buses (seriously, sitting in the front row up on the top level is like the ultimate shotgun, you see everything), the lights all over the city, waking up to listen to the hustle and bustle of people outside...And the accents. I'm usually pretty good about not being a part of stereotyping, but accents in the UK are like a vocal version of high-quality chocolate to me, and I'm known in my family as a chocoholic. I am an accent fangirl, and I'm proud of it!**

**I'm also rather surprised to find so many Doctor Who references that seem to have popped up while I was in Europe. Aside from the Doctor Who Experience itself, in Germany we had three things happen on the same day: one of our older relatives had a statue in his garden that looks disturbingly like one of the "Saved" interfaces from the Doctor Who episode _Silence in the Library_, and on top of that, we took family pictures and Dad, the camera man, kept telling us "Stay out of the shadows!", and then when we were driving later on the rock hit our windshield and made a great big crack. Not to mention I kept finding Tardis blue stuff everywhere: blue buildings, blue jewelry, blue clothes, even a man in a Tardis blue full-body jumpsuit in England who passed us by when we visited a food festival. Weird, huh?**

**Unfortunately, we didn't get to go visit Spain, or either half of Italy. There wasn't enough time, since the schedule Mom planned for us didn't allow for it. Hopefully the next time I go to Europe, I'll be able to go see it. Although in France we had a ton of tourists from Italy and Spain on the beaches with us, so I still got a bit of a taste of both countries. **

**Anyway, thank you very much for being so patient with me these past few weeks away. I hadn't gotten the chance to get on the computer until recently, since my sister and I had no access to technology during the trip. However, we stayed the last few days of our trip with a wealthy realtive and his family (they own and operate a manufacturing and distribution business for high-quality organic wine), and they were nice enough to let me use their Ipad to type up this and the chapters I wrote in my notebook. I'll be uploading each chapter that I wrote while I was on vacation one at a time, so the updates will probably be between one to three times a week if possible, depending on the rest of my summer plans and homework. **


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